Supreme Court agrees to hear ANILCA challenge

Last week the Alaska Department of Law announced the United States Supreme Court will take up its legal challenge to federal regulatory oversight.

On Friday the department confirmed the nation’s highest court would hear Sturgeon v. Masica, a case in which Alaska filed an amicus brief asking the Court to take a stand against federal regulatory overreach. The Court will consider whether Section 103(c) of the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act of 1980 (ANILCA) prohibits the National Park Service (NPS) from exercising regulatory control over state, Native corporation, and private lands located within the boundaries of the National Park System.

“This case raises a question of exceptional importance to the state, Native corporations, and the people of Alaska,” said Attorney General Craig Richards in a release. “The right to regulate and manage Alaska’s resources is an essential component of Alaska’s sovereignty, and Alaska has a compelling interest in preserving our right to manage our state’s resources free from unchecked federal control.”

The case considers whether ANILCA permits the federal government to exercise broad regulation over nonfederal lands and waters in Alaska. In 2007, armed NPS officials barred John Sturgeon from using his hovercraft within the Yukon-Charley Rivers National Preserve while he was traveling on the Nation River to access moose hunting grounds outside the preserve.

Sturgeon sued, arguing that the service’s actions violated the language and intent of ANILCA. NPS held it had the authority to regulate such activity. Last fall the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals agreed, ruling that ANILCA does give the federal government broad ability to regulate non-federal lands and waters.

The Department of Law and a number of Native Corporations filed “friend of the court” briefs on Sturgeon’s behalf and urged the Supreme Court to take up the case. The state intends to submit an additional amicus brief in support of Sturgeon to the Supreme Court, which will likely hear oral arguments in the case in January or February.